easy question....Does hyposalinity affect crabs?

[Dr.Nate]

Does hyposalinity (mine's at 1.020) affect crabs (or shrimp or snails for that matter)? The reason I ask is because I have a dead emerald crab and all my other water parameters are perfect.

 

[Phyl]

Yes. Crabs, shrimp and snails are affected by hypo (1.009). I'm not sure how low of a drop they can tolerate though before they go belly up. 1.020 is really just at the bottom of the range of acceptable (unless you're using a refractometer). What they are not tolerant of is a fast dramatic swing. Did something happen to rapidly drop your salinity recently?

 

[Dr.Nate]

no, I've gradually moved it down from 1.022 to 1.020 over a week's time to help with my ick. So I shouldn't go any lower I take it? I've got three more crabs, two shrimp, and two snails.

 

[Phyl]

Your inverts aren't going to survive a good hypo treatment. Do you have fish in there too? If not then just the time without fish will rid your tank of ich.

If you have fish that you're trying to cure could you QT them instead? Otherwise you'll need to QT your inverts...

 

[Dr.Nate]

I've been battling ich for awhile now trying to do everything I can without QT, but I guess I'm finally gonna have to go that route.....I've got a blue tang, clown, and a bicolors pseudochromis. All the rest are inverts.

 

[Phyl]

Once you have a QT setup you'll be glad you did. Any future fish you add can go in there first and you'll catch the ich before it ends up in your main again. I'm so glad that I QT'd my purple tang before dropping him in the main. I can't imagine having to deal with ich on all of my fish.